Street Corner Karate and Barrel Thieves – A Brink Release You Need To Know About

Before we dig the details of these beers (or the beers that have been announced from this project so far), I have to share a little bit of the backstory – only because it’s so phenomenal.

The idea for these beers started as an idea from The Party Source. They reached out to Brink to share a couple of really fun barrels that they had (including a killer Knob Creek barrel that was 14 years old). These barrels aren’t the typical ones that you’ll find on a regular basis, so they needed something special to go inside them too.

The idea for what was originally called “I Challenge You To A Duel” was born. Two beers would be brewed up – one from the folks at Party Source and one from the community at the increasingly infamous Cincinnati Craft Beer Club (a facebook group that you can find here). Each team would head to Brink to help develop a recipe and brew it with the team there. Then would come up with variants along the way and a name to match what they wanted their beer to be.

This is where a new part of the story gets going.

You Can’t Even Pack My Lunch.

There is a tendency to be some drama from time to time in the online groups within our community. This is represented maybe in the finest style by a video posted in the spring of 2018 on the group by one of it’s **Clearly** drunken members going on a rant about his treatment over beer choices? Maybe about him being angry that people he was talking to didn’t like a brewery? Maybe he was just having a bad day – but the video is glorious. Some of the highlights for you:

I lost my job because the people around me was scared I was too aggressive… I’m VERY FUCKING AGGRESSIVE. I fucking get down, and I mean motherfucking business. Half of you people couldn’t pack my fucking LUNCH!

Half of you couldn’t pack my fucking lunch, let alone meet me on that corner right there and do Karate, workout, fix yourself up and be pretty. Half of you motherfuckers couldn’t meet me on that corner!

The beautiful four and half minute rant ends with this gentleman throwing his glass into his sink… it’s crazy, wonderful, and showcases the other side to the drama that some people think is just light-hearted ribbing. It also spawned the CCBC name of the collaboration – Street Corner Karate. The group not only came up with the name within itself, voted on variants but also crowdsourced the idea for the artwork from within the group as well.

Aside from the angry part of the drama that spawned the name, this is a great example of what makes Cincinnati’s Facebook beer scene so great, the ability to showcase their differences and use them to come together over one thing – Beer. Collaboration with local breweries is something that I hope to see a lot more of in 2019… it’s a great way to tie it together for a lot of drinkers.

The Party Source’s side of the collaboration is called Barrel Thieves & Hired Guns and includes Molasses, Vanilla, and Chocolate. I think that’s a good Segway into talking about the first of the two releases and what beers you’ll see.

Release #1 – January 19th

While I can’t promise that anyone will pack anyone else’s lunches for this, or that there will be any working out or looking pretty on the corner – the beer should be great. The series is so big and so fantastic that the brewery is splitting it up into two separate events (the second one will be on February 2nd)

This first one will feature 4 different beers from two different barrels.